


Serenity and Rage

by ald0us



Category: Firefly, Star Trek, Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Post-Serenity, Pre-Star Trek: Into Darkness, Star Trek: Into Darkness
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-05-17
Updated: 2015-05-17
Packaged: 2018-03-31 01:21:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,279
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3959095
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ald0us/pseuds/ald0us
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When the Serenity discovers a lone cryo-stasis pod floating in Rim space, its occupant—a man calling himself John Harrison—offers the crew a deal: his skills for passage. These skills prove prodigious and the man himself inscrutable, yet Harrison continues to surprise them. Unbeknownst to them, however, inevitable conflict looms between two captains who would do anything for their crew.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Serenity and Rage

            “Not to fret Cap’n, everything’s fine,” Kaylee soothed, then gave a small yelp as _Serenity’s_ axillary engine gave a huge groan and spat a shower of sparks.

            “‘Fine?!’” Captain Malcom Reynolds exclaimed. “Kaylee, we’re trying to make a landing here! She’s gotta _glide_ to the ground like, not _fall_!”

            “ _Serenity’s_ not gonna fall nowhere, Cap’n,” she promised, though the panic with which she hurried around the small engine compartment betrayed the truth of the situation.

            “Good,” Mal said, then spun around to ask the supposed genius flying his boat why the landing protocol hadn’t been engaged—

            “Though—Cap’n!”

            Mal stopped short with a knowing sigh. “Yes, Kaylee?”

            “We might not be making a _landing_ all that soon like,” she told him, gloved hands out in a conciliatory gesture.

            “Then what might I suppose we _will_ be doing?” Mal demanded.

            “Well, don’t be angry now, but we’ll be in orbit—“

            “ _Orbit_?!” Mal yelped. “We’ve got cargo due an hour ago—!”

            “Yes, orbit, Cap’n,” Kaylee said. “And we’ve got cargo due nowhere, and that’s a fact. We’re just here so you can drop off Inara—“

            “Not a word,” Mal cut her off. “You work on our landing, right, and I’ll worry about the cargo—“

            “Cargo? What cargo?” Zoe’s voice interrupted him in turn. “We haven’t had a proper cargo in months, other than that one delivery for Badger. We’re just here to drop off Inara—”

            Mal flushed despite himself. “I know that, thanks.”

            “I said so!” Kaylee crowed, thrusting up a greasy wrench in triumph. “C’mon, Cap’n, admit it! This is perfect! You can finally confess your true feelings to her—“

            “Mal, why aren’t we loosing altitude?” Inara’s voice demanded. Inara herself appeared a moment later, looking aggravated.

            Mal gave her his best snake-oil-salesman’s smile. “We’re just experiencing a mite of technical difficulties, if you’d please make your way back to your seat—“

            “Don’t give me that, Mal. What’s wrong with _Serenity_?”

            “Oh, we’re just stuck in orbit for a little while,” Kaylee told her brightly.

            If she’d expected Inara to take this as good news, she was gravely disappointed. “We’re _what_?!”

            Kaylee’s face fell. “I’ll just get workin’ on fixing _Serenity_ —”

            “Hey, Mal!” Jayne’s voice called. He didn’t sound happy. “Why ain’t we movin’?”

            “ _Because_ —“ Mal began in thundering tones.

            “Technical difficulties,” Zoe explained.

            “Oh.” Jayne said. “Um, the kid wants to see you—“

            “Captain Mal?” River Tam’s soft voice said from right next to him.

            “Gorram it!” Mall yelled. His demeanor softened when he saw _Serenity’s_ youngest crew member. “Oh, it’s you. What’s happening?”

            “An unidentifiable object is on a collision vector with ours, and we have lost all thrust capability.” River informed him.

            “Perfect!” Mal cried. “Kaylee, why don’t we have any thrust?”

            “Feedback, Cap’n!” Kaylee called. “It wrecked real havoc on our relays—“

            “Well, how long until we get it back?”

            “Near-abouts two days, Cap’n,” came the wary estimate.

            “ _Two days_?!” Mal yelped. “River, what’s the estimated time to collision?”

            River thought a moment. “Approximately twenty-one minutes and thirty-two point oh forty-five seconds.”

            Mal could only stare and nod. “Oh, good.”

            “Collision?” Simon Tam’s voice interrupted.

            “What is this, the local bar?!” Mal exclaimed. “Get back to your jobs, will ya?”  
  
            “What about the collision?” Inara demanded.

            “ _What_ collision?!” Simon exclaimed.

            “Kaylee, we need thrust _now_!”

            “No can do, Cap’n!” Kaylee called back, sounding panicked. “It’s all I can do to keep us in orbit!”

            Mal pushed his hair back from his forehead, thinking hard. “Can we force a decay in our orbit vector?”

            “Not unless we want to completely fry the auxiliaries,” she replied. “I’m sorry, Cap’n—“

            “Jayne. Any brilliant ideas?”

            “Plenty.” Jayne replied. “Grenades, assault rifles, knives—“

            “About the collision, Jayne.”

            “Oh.” he thought a moment. “Grenades?”

            Mal nodded. “I thought as much. Zoe?”

            “Let the auxiliaries fry and chance a crash-landing?”

            The words “crash” and “landing” did not go well together in Mal’s mind in connection to his boat. “Less destructive ideas?” he fished hopefully.

            River continued to watch him unblinkingly.

            “No! Wait, I got it!” Mal exclaimed. “Kaylee, stay here and make sure she don’t combust. Jayne, Zoe, everyone—you too, Inara—I need you in the hangar!” He took off down _Serenity_ ’s corridors.

            “Mal—“ Jayne tried.

            “No time!” was the reply.

            “ _Mal_ —“ Zoe repeated.

 

 

            Moments later, they were all pushing crates about the hangar floor.

            “Why are we building a wall?” Zoe shouted above the scraping and banging and clamor.

            “A crash landing!” was the only reply she got.

            “What?” Simon exclaimed. “I thought we _weren’t_ doing a crash landing!”

            “Of course _we’re_ not,” Mal snorted, as if amused by both the doctor’s confusion and his inability to lift two crates at once. “Jayne—?”

            Jayne seized the crates from Simon and hefted them easily onto the growing block between the hangar doors and furthest wall, grinning cheekily at the now-glowering doctor.

            “Inara, start getting everything that is not a crate or crash-webbing out of here.” Mal ordered. “No, I don’t care where you put it, just get it where it won’t be here. River, you’re the best at climbin’. Get the hook together the crash webbings and start strappin’ the crates in. Good, just like that. Simon, go check how much time we have left,” he finished, taking the crate from the last and completing the block. “Atta boy,” he added as Simon obeyed with a scowl.

            “Just what the hell are we doin’, Mal?” Jayne demanded.

            “Collidin’,” was Mal’s reply. “You almost done there, River?”

            “Yes.”

            “We better scramble, quick. Get down from there—we oughta make sure that brother of yours hasn’t managed to set the boat aflame, huh?”

            River smiled. Then, “Who’s going to release and close the doors?”

            Mal blinked, surprised she’d caught on so quick, then grinned. He should have expected that. “You think I’d let anyone else have the fun?”

            “Doors?” Jayne barked. “What doors?”

            Mal shook his head. “Get outta the hangar and seal the door real safe. River, I’m gonna need you to give me the count-down, got it?”

            She nodded.

            “Wha’?” Jayne said, utterly lost. “I thought you were shutting them doors—“

            Wordlessly, River took his hand and steered him towards the stairs to the hangar exit, favoring Mal with her best yet attempt at a wink.

            “Well, uh, good luck,” Jayne called over his shoulder, still looking mildly bewildered.

            “Thanks.” Mal would need it.

 

           

            “How long now?” Mal asked, rubbing his palms on his shirt for nearly the twentieth time that minute.

            “Two minutes and fifty-seven seconds to collision,” River’s voice informed him. “You still want me to tell you when you reach the one-minute mark, correct?”

            Mal scowled at the implicit teasing. “I ain’t gettin’ jumpy!”

            “I never said you were, Mal.”

            “Aw, gorram it,” Mal complained, though he secretly felt himself smile. He’d been working to get her to call him by name—and she just had.

            It wasn’t much of an accomplishment, but to Mal it was a victory over the Alliance, who’d messed her up so bad in the first place—a more important victory than a battle: it helped River. River, part of his crew.

            “Mal?” This time it was Zoe. “Mal, can you hear us?”

            “Huh? Oh!” Checking a last time to see that the last square of crash webbing was still secured around his middle, Mal took a deep breath and palmed the release to _Serenity’s_ hangar.

            Immediately he felt the ferocious tug of vacuum, malicious, intent on sucking him out into the clammy black—he was suspended, clinging to life—he wondered if it was how his boat felt, gliding through the black—like a leaf on the wind—no, he couldn’t afford to think of Wash now, of Zoe—he had to focus—

            There was a titanic crash, and Mal felt himself slam his fist into the door release again, clutching his breather mask to his face as a lifeline.

            The floor slammed into Mal’s face and he breathed a sigh of relief. It worked. “It worked something fierce,” he reported.

            “Are you all right?” This from Simon.

            “Don’t worry, Doc, you won’t have to worry about seeing my smiling face in your little medbay,” Mal cracked, clambering up slowly, still feeling the impact in his bones, ready to inspect the damage to his boat.

            “What is it, Cap’n?” Kaylee asked.

            Mal ambled to the pile of now-demolished crates. He shoved a few smashed crates aside—

            And froze. There, in Mal’s hangar, was a slim, grey pod, just a little wider and far taller than himself. Through the only small, dim window into the capsule, he could see a man’s face.

            “What is it?” Jayne repeated.

            “I—” Mal said through suddenly numb lips, “I don’t rightly know.”

 

 

            “I want that hangar sealed off,” Mal announced. “No one is to go into it, hear?”

            “What?” Zoe said. “What is it?”

            Mal shook his head. Their glance of silent communication was enough.

            “Well, you gotta tell us,” Jayne said. “We’ve got our rights to know, don’t we?”

            “I don’t have anything to say,” Mal said. “Seal the hangar.”

            “But Cap’n—“ This from Kaylee.

            “Seal it!”

            His crew grew silent.

            “It’s done,” Zoe reported.

            “Thank you,” said Mal.

            “So were it valuable?” Jayne asked.

            Mal shook his head.

            “Was it?” he repeated.

            “I don’t know.”

            “How can you not know—“

            “He’s _scared_ , Jayne,” Inara interrupted suddenly, as if this should be obvious.

            Mal couldn’t help a flash of indignation. Like she knew anything—

           As if reading his mind, she clarified, “And if _Mal'_ s scared, you can bet there’s a good reason.”

            Mal aimed a nod of thanks her way. He said, “I _am_ scared. Because I haven’t the tiniest little of clues of what’s happening.”

            “Oh,” said Jayne, even more confused than before, as if the idea of _Mal_ being _scared_ was even more incomprehensible than before.

 

           

            “Doc. Where’s that sister of yours?”

            Simon turned around, then said politely, “Her name is River, Jayne.”

            Jayne grunted noncommittally. “Where is she?”

            “I don’t know,” Simon admitted. “Why?”

            “Well, I was just getting to thinking, and—“

            “Hey Doc,” Mal called. “Know where your sister’s gotten to?”

            Simon sighed. “Her name’s River—“

            “I know that,” Mal interrupted. He frowned, angry for the implication. “What, you think I don’t?”

            “Well, you never call her—“

            “Captain.” Zoe stood in the doorway. “The hangar seal’s been breached. From the inside.”

            “River. Told you,” Mal said to Simon. “C’mon, let’s go see what she’s up to now—“

            “Don’t blame River for it—“ Simon began angrily.

            Mal ignored him and thundered to the hangar. It was his boat, gorram it! _His_ boat!

 

 

            “He’s so sad,” River whispered, peering intently just over the glass. “I just wanted his nightmares to end...”

            Simon put a hand on her shoulder. “It’s okay, River. We understand—“  
  
            “Do we?” Mal demanded. “What exactly do we understand now, precisely? Why you’re here, or why you disobeyed my direct order to keep this hangar sealed—“

            “No,” River said matter-of-factly. “Why I woke him up.”

            “Woke—him _up_?!” Mal choked. “How— _what_?!”

            Simon didn’t seem much troubled. “River, I know you can sometimes get confused—“

            River gave her genius-level older brother a look that could only be described as a ‘gawd-Simon-don’t-be-so-gorram-stupid.’ “He _was_ asleep.”

            Simon frowned. Then his eyes grew large. “A _cryo-pod_? A vacuum-resistent _cryo-pod_?”

            River shook her head, as if unable to believe how slow Simon was. “Correct.”

            “But the Alliance...even they don’t have...”

            “Exactly.” River returned to observing the glass surface. Her breath made a thin patch of fog on the surface, just obscuring its contents from view.

           With a sharp _hiss!_ the pod’s seemingly seamless door lifted on silent hydraulics.

 

 

            “I...dreamed,” the man said. His colorless lips barely moved as he said it, his voice no more than a mumble.

            “Sorry?” Mal said, standing akimbo. “I didn’t right hear you.”

            He didn’t reply.

            “Check him out, Doc,” Mal said.

            “It’s just his subconscious talking,” Simon explained, eyeing _Serenity_ ’s captain like he was simultaneously insane and an idiot. “He’s going to wake up very slowly. There’s no way to speed up the process without harming him.”

            “How long?” Mal asked. “Because I’m havin’ half a mind to push him right back into the black—“

            “No, Cap’n!”

            Mal turned in surprise. “Kaylee?”

            “Don’t do it!” Kaylee continued. “We don’t know who he is, or what he’s doin’ here—“

            “Exactly!” Mal exclaimed. “He could be anyone! He could even be another Agent, sent to take River—“

            “Well, we can’t send him nowhere, anyhow,” Kaylee interrupted with a note of triumph. “We can’t open them hangar doors again without bustin’ the entire auxiliaries completely, until I get _Serenity_ back on her wings. An’ as I’d been tellin’ you, that’ll take—“

            “Days, yes, thank you, Kaylee,” Mal said in mounting frustration. “Well, I ain’t gonna sit ‘round here all day waiting for Mister Mysterious here to wake from his beauty sleep. Kaylee, get to ‘em engines. Jayne, River, stay here and guard him, and get me when he wakes up. Zoe, you’re with me, tryin’ to convince Badger why he shouldn’t be a right gorram bitch when we’re late with his cargo. And no funny business, you,” he added to River, who widened her eyes in innocence.

            “What about me?” Simon asked.

            “You’re right,” Mal said, sounding annoyed. “Where _is_ Inara? She’s on my boat, she ought to be doin’ something—“

            Simon did not look amused. “What do you want _me_ to do?”

            River stifled a giggle.

            “Oh right, Mal said. “Stay out of the way and monitor Sleeping Beauty here—wait, no, you’re on Zoe and me.” He winked and clapped the doctor on the shoulder. “They always say Badger likes a pretty face, don’t they, Kaylee?”

            Simon blushed. So did Kaylee.

 

 

            “Aww, c’mon,” Mal said, spreading his arms in a gesture of friendship “When was I ever a mite over schedule before?”

            Badger assumed a sarcastic simulacrum of deep pondering. “Hmm, let’s see. Oh, that’s right, never!”

            Mal grinned brightly; Zoe winced, as did Simon. “Exactly—!”

            “You were never a _mite_ over schedule, Mal, because you are always _very_ over schedule,” Badger snapped, all pretense dropped. “This is the last time. No more, Mal. You may be a good captain, but you ain’t so hot for my timetables.”

            “Badger—“

            “It’s—it’s my fault!” Simon exclaimed suddenly, jolting forwards. Both Zoe and Mal stared at him in astonishment. So did Badger.

            “Just ignore him—“ Mal began, but Badger cut him off.

            “No, let’s hear what the young man has to say,” he drawled. “Or rather, what he’s been _scripted_ to say.”

            “It’s not a script,” Simon said. “In fact, I’m quite sure Mal isn’t going to be happy with me for saying this—“

            “Oh good,” Mal muttered, and Zoe looked almost amused.

            “Do go on,” Badger said, smirking. “Making Mal unhappy don’t sound too bad to me.”

            Simon gulped. “Well, you see, we aren’t late because of any coolant leak from the cargo extraction—“

            “What are you _saying_?!” Mal hissed. To Badger, he said, “Sorry, the kid’s a doctor. Mighty fine one, too, but he don’t know his ass from his elbow on the matter of a boat—“

            “Shut up, Mal,” Badger said lazily. To Simon, “You were sayin’, doctor?”

            “I begged Mal to stop over one of the Rim Planets because I recognized a certain medical object floating around in the black. I told him it’d be very worth his while to stop and pick it up.”

            Badger chuckled. “I sure hope you were right, because I can’t see Captain Reynolds being so kind to you if you weren’t.”

            Simon just looked even more nervous, even though it was all a complete fabrication. He glanced at Mal, who stared back at him in blank confusion, and gulped again.

            Badger couldn’t contain himself any longer. “Well, was it?”

            Simon nodded. “Very. More so than I’d thought.”

            Badger narrowed his eyes. “How much so? Rare? Very rare?”

            Simon leaned forwards slightly. In a lowered tone, he said, “Unique.”

            “Unique?”  
  
            “Invaluable,” Simon continued. “Never-been-seen, even by the Alliance.”

            Even over the wave’s gritty screen, Badger’s eyes shone bright with greed. Then suspicion melted his sudden pliability. “An’ how would you know _that_?”

            “I am an Alliance-educated doctor.” Simon said, looking suddenly and unaccountably aristocratic. His eyes narrowed. “One of the best. If anyone would know, I would.”

            Badger rubbed at his mouth. “Would you be willing to part with this item?”

            Simon shrugged. “It’s not mine, it’s Mal’s.”

            Mal could have kissed him. He grinned at Badger, who grinned back.

            He said, “You know, Captain Reynolds, I think we might just be able to do business.”

 

 

            “I didn’t actually want to _give_ it to him!” Mal whined.

            “You’re not giving him anything,” Zoe reminded him. “He’s buying it off you, forgiving us being late, _and_ promising us another job.”

            “Yes, but I’d been wanting to keep it—“

            “You should be glad he’s keeping it,” Simon interrupted. “Having technology like that—the Alliance would murder to get their hands on it.”

            “Well, I don’t intend to get _caught_ by the Alliance!” Mal snapped.

            Simon huffed. “You’re just ungrateful. I saved you, and you know it—“

            “I know nothing of the kind, doctor-boy,” Mal fired back. “I was doin’ just fine before you took it upon your martyring self to shove in and—“

            Simon was about to argue that before he saw Zoe frown and shake her head over Mal’s shoulder. “Fine. I’m going to go see how River and Jayne are doing. I don’t want to miss him coming out of stasis.”

            “You do that!” Mal called after him.

            “Captain, he _did_ save us on this one,” Zoe said quietly once Simon had gone.

            “ _I_ know that!” Mal protested. “I just don’t want _him_ knowin’ it too!”

 

           

            “Hurry!” Jayne said. “Mal, he’s almost awake!”

            “I’m doin’ that!” Mal exclaimed, sprinting down _Serenity’s_ narrow corridors to the hangar bay, yelling for the rest of his crew to come. By the time he’d barreled down the stairs to the hangar floor, even Inara had come to witness the action.

            The man was already standing. He was tall, muscled, and pale, with dark, curled hair and sharp, prominent cheekbones, ageless. He exuded the air of some kind of archaic warrior-king—violence rolled off him in waves—but the sense came from no specific attribute except perhaps his eyes, cold and pale. Looking closely at him Mal felt like he was staring into deep space. It was odd: in attributes he could almost have been River and Simon’s ancestor—he even had the same innate air about him—but Mal’s instincts screamed that he could not be more unlike the Tams.

            “I’m Malcom Reynolds, captain of the _Serenity,_ ” Mal introduced himself formally. He did not extend a hand to shake—his instinct told him this man was dangerous enough he could do a lot with an extended hand. “This is my crew.”

            The stranger did not move or speak for a long while, his pale eyes taking in every detail and every crevice of his situation. Finally he said, “You are not of the Earth fleet.” His voice was deep, intelligent, pointed.

            “The what now?” Mal said politely.

            “The Earth Military Fleet. You are not of them. This is not a Earth vessel.”

            “This ain’t anyone’s vessel but mine, pal.” Mal told him, proudly.

            At these words the aura of violence evaporated; the man’s painfully upright posture relaxed slightly. The ice of his eyes melted away, leaving a shine of keen intellect. His bow-shaped lips lifted slightly but remained taut. “John Harrison,” he introduced himself, extending a hand. “I wish to join your crew.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading, and I hope you enjoyed! I came up with this plotline a while back and just now got around to posting it. If you have anything you'd like to say, I look forwards to hearing it in the comments!


End file.
